[R-G] Iraq Prisons Overflow

[David Mcreynolds]

An important story - am passing it along.
Peace,
David

> [Original Message]
> From: cord macguire <cordymac at hotmail.com>
> To: <cordymac at hotmail.com>
> Date: 8/18/2005 10:15:35 AM
> Subject: Iraq Prisons Overflow
>
> 700 More Troops to Be Sent To Iraq to Bolster Prison Operations
> /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
> by Bradley Graham
> Washington Post
>
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/17/AR2005081701
676_pf.html
> August 18, 2005
>
>
> Responding to an appeal for more forces in Iraq to help manage a rising 
> number of detainees, the Pentagon is dispatching an additional 700 troops 
> from the 82nd Airborne Division, defense officials said yesterday.
>
> The previously unscheduled deployment is intended specifically to bolster 
> prison operations, the officials said. It is not part of a temporary 
> increase in U.S. troop levels in Iraq that commanders have said is likely
to 
> enhance security for a planned constitutional referendum in October and 
> governmental elections in December.
>
> "The basic fact driving this deployment is the steady rise in the prison 
> population," said Lt. Col. Barry Venable, a Pentagon spokesman. "There
need 
> to be some additional resources devoted to this."
>
> The number of prisoners held in U.S. military detention centers in Iraq
has 
> more than doubled since the autumn, climbing from 5,400 in September to
more 
> than 10,800 now, according to the latest Pentagon figures. The surge has 
> filled existing prisons to capacity and prompted commanders to embark on
an 
> unanticipated prison expansion plan.
>
> Military officials have attributed the influx of detainees to intensified 
> counterinsurgency operations by Iraqi as well as U.S. forces. But the 
> burgeoning prison population also appears to reflect the persistence of
the 
> insurgency itself.
>
> A formal request for more security forces came in May, officials said,
and 
> approval was granted last month. An announcement by the 82nd Airborne 
> Division's headquarters at Fort Bragg, N.C., on Monday saying that the
1st 
> battalion, 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment, will be going to Iraq 
> contained no information about the unit's mission.
>
> Pentagon officials said the unit will not necessarily provide prison
guards 
> but rather engage in a number of detention-related operations, such as 
> securing the area around a prison compound or transporting detainees from 
> one prison to another.
>
> "They're going to assist however they're needed," Venable said. "But it's 
> best to think of them as a security force, not as prison guards, although 
> some things they might do could bring them into proximity with prisoners."
>
> Crowded conditions at the U.S.-run prison camps and what commanders
describe 
> as an increasingly hard-core inmate population have produced a
combustible 
> mix, confronting U.S. forces with a growing risk of prison violence. Camp 
> Bucca, a sprawling detention facility in the southern Iraqi desert near
the 
> Kuwaiti border where the majority of prisoners are held, experienced two 
> large riots earlier this year.
>
> The danger of outside attack also remains a concern. Last spring, U.S. 
> forces repelled a significant assault by insurgents on Abu Ghraib prison, 
> the U.S. military's primary interrogation center and the site of highly 
> publicized cases of detainee abuse.
>
> The U.S. military runs three main detention centers in Iraq: Camp Bucca
in 
> the south and Abu Ghraib and Camp Cropper in the Baghdad area. But 
> anticipating a continued influx of detainees, a fourth prison, called
Fort 
> Suse, is being built on the site of a Russian-built former Iraqi military 
> barracks near the northern city of Sulaymaniyah.
>
> Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, during a visit to Iraq last month, 
> expressed interest in handing responsibility for detainees to Iraqi 
> authorities "as soon as is feasible." But no date has been set for such a 
> transfer.
>
> ***
>